Keeping Track of My Father's Exit. By Alan G. Ampolsk

The Story So Far

I'm a writer, photographer, consultant. Age 51. My father was a reporter and editor. Then he became something other than that. He died February 8, 2010 at 87. He was widowed in 2003. His decline started a little earlier. His sister died of Alzheimer's.

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An Intelligent Man

Received the assessment from M and have been reviewing it. Initial verdict: She's on target. She gets it. Excerpts:

Mr. A presents as a warm, engaging person who loves company and attention. After a few minutes, it became apparent that he has severe cognitive impairment. When asked a direct question such as birth date or day of the week, he was unable to give correct answers. He easily lost track of his thoughts and his conversation was tangential...

His thought quality and content were incoherent and evidenced memory impairment. He was attentive but rambled in non sequiturs...

It is evident that this is an intelligent man who is suffering a rapid decline in cognitive function.

Yes, that's the story.

The last line really struck me. Nobody else we've dealt with in the past couple of years has picked up on his intelligence. Frankly, I lose sight of it myself, which disturbs me, but there's a price for living in the present. Good that she noticed. I'll have to remind myself. Maybe it doesn't make a difference in how I deal with him but then again maybe it does. The things you're thinking at any given moment affect your tone, and your tone affects him. I don't want to dwell on the way he used to be but on the other hand if you bury it, then you treat him like a patient and he slides a little more. Treat him like a person and he might get a little calmer and a little more stable at whatever point in the decline. You're not going to prevent the decline but you can make it slightly more comfortable...

A plan of action follows. New aides with training in dementia, home safety inspection, a geriatrician to review the case... I was hoping that someone would start to build a care establishment and it seems like that might happen.

I like the tone. I like the directness. Can use more of that.

In a separate e-mail exchange she told me it'll likely be three or four weeks before we can get the CASA aides in place. That'll be the end of E. E and I had a very friendly, very warm phone conversation in which we covered a lot of things and she refused to break her price. You're history, I said to myself...

Last night's visit was relatively tame -- or maybe I'm just getting used to the new cognitive realities. Since I won't be able to visit on Sunday, I gave him some early Father's Day presents. There was a Sports Illustrated book with a lot of photographs. He can't read the book and can't really take in the photographs. But I've always given him books for every occasion and it'd be a bad signal if I stopped. I'll keep it going until he doesn't know what a book is, or maybe a little longer than that. And I gave him a watch. His old digital one had stopped working and he can't follow the numbers, so I switched to analog. He's a little better with that, though not perfect. But he was ecstatic about it. Said that now he wouldn't have to keep asking people the time -- "I can go back to being an adult."

The goal, I guess, is to keep him feeling that way as long as possible.